Just another Qiskit Global Summer School 2020 experience (an honest review version)
Okay, let me be very honest. Before Qiskit Global Summer School, I had absolutely zero experience and knowldge regarding quantum computing. I had studied Schrodinger Wave equations and a bit of atomic chemistry in my 11th standard. Yet that was all for clearing my board examinations and my entrance examinations to the premiere engineering institutes in India (engineering aspirants and undergraduate students will get what I’m talking about). I was good at linear algebra, because my primary topic of interest before Quantum Computing was Deep Learning and Computer Vision (they still continue to be my research interests).
One day, when I was scrolling my LinkedIn feed, I had a connection with Amira Abbas, who had just posted that some kind of virtual online Global Summer School was going to be organised (yeah Qiskit Global Summer School). A bored me thought, “Okay, this is interesting. Let’s see who all are eligible for this so called ‘Summer School’, and what are its pre-requisites.” I headed over to the website and checked the requirements and eligibility.
Well this seems interesting, let’s check the eligibility and pre-requisites.
The prerequisites mentioned here only tell one part of the full story. Believe me, this is not all for a beginner to understand Quantum Computing topics fully. Barely did I know then the other side of the story. I thought, “Just python programming and linear algebra? Huh, I can do this. I have been doing python and linear algebra since the beginning of my undergraduate studies.” So I enrolled myself for the program.
Then came their e-mail saying to wait till 13th or 14th July (I guess) to check whether I’m eligible as a lab student or not. They have said that only the first 2000 students enrolling for this program will be eligible for being a lab-student.
Fast forward to 17th July, I just received my email confirming that I was enrolled as a lab-student. Great news.
20th July, I receive an email to join the Discord server. An excited me quickly hopped onto the server, to see that Josie (who later turned out to be the best guide and moderator of the Discord server), was segregating lab-students from other students. I typed the command !labstudent on the server, and within 10 minutes, Josie identified me as a lab-student. Thanking Josie, I waited for the class to start.
Okay, don’t expect me to give a details of each and every class, and what we were taught. I’ll give an overview of the topics discussed here. For a more detailed discussion, check my friend Hirmay’s article.
First day, Elisa Baumer, our lecturer, taught us the basics of quantum computing, Bell States, Hadamard gates, entanglement, quantum teleportation, etc. (Check her article to know more about her experience as our lecturer). Brian (who later turned out to be everyone’s favourite host) was hosting the three hour lecture, taking our doubts and questions to the lecturer, and cracking jokes with us in the mean-time as well. Second day, Elisa taught us Deutsch-Jozsa Algorithm and Grover’s Algorithm. After each lecture, we had to perform a lab work on Jupyter notebooks and submit them. Our lab instructions were provided by none other than everyone’s favourite, Abraham Asfaw (Education Lead, IBM Quantum). Yes, he is the same guy you will find in Qiskit’s YouTube channel in their popular series Coding with Qiskit.
Then comes Abraham Asfaw (Abe) to explain us Quantum Phase Estimation, Quantum Fourier transform, and most importantly, Shor’s Algorithm. A brilliant lecturer, Abe taught us all the necessary concepts and topics with enough mathematical proofs. To be honest, it was his lectures that ignited my interest in quantum computing. This was followed by labs in Jupyter as well. Well learning session. James Wootton came on the 5th day, and taught us about Quantum Error Correction, along with some lab work as well.
On the weekend, a number of Discord study groups were formed, and everyone stayed busy connecting with each other, revising the past week’s lectures and collecting more resources to study about these topics.
Roll Week 2.
Zlatko Minev introduces us to superconducting qubit, transmon qubits and anharmonic oscillators. We came to know about the various technologies that are used in creating a quantum computer. Someone who is interested with the hardware behind quantum computers have found these lectures very useful.
Antonio Mezzacapo and Abhinav Kandala taught us quantum chemistry, quantum algorithms and most importantly, how to simulate molecules using Variational Quantum Eigensolvers. It was important because our final project was based on this topic. Yes, interested students could take part in a final project that was organised by Qiskit. With this, our Qiskit Global Summer School 2020 lectures ended.
Final day. Qiskit organised a live-stream on YouTube regarding the topic “Careers in Quantum Computing”. Amira Abbas (yes the person for whom I could attend this awesome summer school) was our host, and renowned quantum experts of the world joined us and answered some of our queries regarding careers in quantum computing. The panelists were
Jay Gambetta, IBM Fellow and Vice President, IBM Quantum
Marina Radulaski, Assistant Professor of Electrical & Computer Engineering at UC Davis
K. Birgitta Whaley, Director, Berkeley Quantum Information and Computation Center
Steve Girvin, Eugene Higgins Professor of Physics at Yale University
Monika Schleier-Smith, Associate Professor of Physics at Stanford University
John Preskill, Richard P. Feynman Professor of Theoretical Physics, Allen V.C. Davis and Lenabelle Davis Leadership Chair, IQIM
We then took part in the Qiskit final project, where we simulated the ground state energy of LiH molecule, and compared how it varied with inter-atomic distance. We were formed teams of 5 by Josie, and I’m thankful that my teammates were very active throughout the project. We submitted our project 25 minutes before the deadline, and at about 9 p.m. on 7th August, our project was finally displayed.
This ended the Qiskit Global Summer School 2020. It was such an amazing experience, a must-attend event for all the quantum computing enthusiasts out there. We learnt so much, made new friends, created study groups, and most importantly, entered the world of quantum computing. I would thank all our lecturers, moderators, mentors and guides for the wonderful experience. Special thanks to Josie for efficiently moderating the Discord server, Brian for being such a lively host, and Amira Abbas for connecting with me and posting about the Summer School on LinkedIn. To all the quantum computing enthusiasts out there who missed this summer school, you all can learn quantum computing from the Qiskit website, Qiskit textbook, Qiskit’s YouTube channel, etc. There’s a plethora of resources in this field, and trust me, the community is very welcoming. You can also join Qiskit’s Slack channel and begin your journey. All you need is determination, interest and a pre-requisite knowledge in multiplication of matrices and basics of Python programming :)
Till then, happy quantum computing
